Fianna Fail clearly want slave labor in the private sector. We already have one of the highest retirement age in Europe (retirement age in most European countries is 62). Micheal Martin also making ridiculous promises despite no plans written for this. This sounds like another experiment by FF to bolster their poll.

Apparently the head of Goldman Sachs wants to raise the retirement age. http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2012/11/the-head-of-goldman-sachs-wants-to-raise-your-retirement-age/265475/
Reason enough, surely, to oppose any such idea.

It’s naked ageism to force him to retire if he can still do his work.

He only has nothing to do if he chooses to do nothing. Does his employer dictate his activities after he finishes??
Why not look into setting up something himself?

@Paul

Good point my father has done this, he retired last year at the age of 60. But let’s be honest setting up a business from scratch at that age isn’t for everybody.

If someone can still do a job at 65 (probably better than a graduate) and they want to keep doing it, then that is blatant discrimination to force them to retire.

Yeah, I agree about forced retirement, I was just highlighting that retirement isn’t necessarily the end.

Like Colette says – READ the Motion operative word is – IF –
I have seen too many friends die within 2 years of retirement because they were FORCED to retire.
It should be the Individuals CHOICE
Closely related to this is that benefits stop accruing after 40 years work, whether you are state or private employed yet you still keep paying the same pension contribution. So you could end up paying 49 years contributions and get a pension based on 40 years

Exactly, we as a country don’t have jobs for the younger generation, never mind a retirement age until we sort out the biggest problem first

Who’s going to pay for your retirement. The ratio of workers to pensioners is approaching 1:1. When the French set 65 as the state retirement age it as the countries life expectancy.

I will be 68 in 2051…..god that’s depressing enough without this shower of sh*tes making me work longer…..

Ripedoffagain, there is no connection between the availability of work for young people and older people carrying on working. The very idea is absurd and illogical.

William what absurd or illogical about it? Old person retires = position available for someone else.

Aaron, search below for my comment re JCB’s v spades v spoons.

OK, “Old Person retires”, his salary drops from €2,000 per month to €800, stops going to the pub because he can’t afford it, ditto a few other “old” friends, pub lays off young bar man and €1200/mth in earnings is lost to the economy in total. It’s MUCH better that the young person gets his own job and doesn’t pinch someone else’s.

Furthermore if it’s logical to fire him at 65 to create a job for a young person, why not 60, 55, 50, 45, 40……….

PS What’s an “old person”? What age is this?

Is the age of retirement today to be based on when office staff in the 1930’s retired and when people died around 65?

Well we can follow on from your example.

‘Old person’ and four of his friends retire and can’t go for their few pints so the pub has to let a member of staff go. Thats unfortunate but then you have the other side of the coin.

‘Younger person’ and four of his friends take up the available positions. They now have more money in their pockets, they drink more than the guys who have had to retire so the pub has to hire two extra members of staff to cope with demand.

Of course it’s much better if the younger person got his own job and didn’t pinch someone elses but there are limited positions out there. If we don’t want our young people emigrating then we need to ensure there’s either enough new jobs created each year to cope with the demand (which is near impossible at the minute) or that there is a set age where people retire.

And personally I would rate anyone classed as a senior citizen as an old person.

Jeyus people get fierce stressed and upset on these posts………….it’s great reading.
All I can say is I have been working for 22 years , never unemployed , thank t f , I enjoy my work but enjoy my family and time off more , hence IF I had saved enough money to retire at 55 I will , if not I I’ll keep working , no big deal. Everyone to here own.

There aren’t “limited positions out there”. Unemployment is entirely caused by excessive government spending and interference in people’s lives and business. If there was a much smaller government, there would be full employment. Two young people I know got jobs in the last few weeks, in fact one of them has since been offered a better job. By firing the working older person, the economy loses out. If the fired, unemployable older person stays unemployed for the next 30 years, the economy is permanently damaged. If the young person makes or gets his own job the economy is improved. btw The same argument used to be made about working women, that they took men’s jobs. Did you know that?

You can’t say that the young people working would put back the lost job. They might spend their money on crack cocaine! At any rate the best would be the status quo, no improvement in the economy. If a young person in Ireland can’t get a job, then p1ss off elsewhere and stop whining! Ryanair will get you to London for €40.

Aaron, why did you ignore this point as it logically follows on from your argument, “Furthermore if it’s logical to fire him at 65 to create a job for a young person, why not 60, 55, 50, 45, 40……….”

Do you think spoons beat spades beat JCBs?

There isn’t a limited amount of jobs out there. There is infinite amounts. There are jobs out there that people couldn’t imagine 20 years ago. Invent something, create something new and work at it. We don’t need people to die or quit their jobs in order to create new jobs.

Not if they signed a contract that explicitly stated they must finish when they are 65.

The new rules aren’t for when you retire, they’re for when the State will graciously hand out your contributory pension.

Sure.

I know you can retire when you like. What I mean (I wasn’t clear here, sorry) is that the state should still pay a full pension from that age, should the person require it. Right now there is an incentive to work until 65 over 60, but there’s no incentive to work until 70 from the state, over 65.

I wouldn’t like to see a sliding scale of pension appear, all state benefits should be at the same rate, activated on retirement, whether you choose to work on, or not.

As people have said here already, the condition of 65 year olds can largely be influenced by the nature of their work. There shouldn’t be an improved pension @70, 75 or whatever enticing them to work on in a job that’s breaking their back – certainly not the state pension anyway

You’ll be forcibly retired at 65 but won’t be entitled to the pension until 66-68 (depending on your age now). But try getting a job if you’re over 60!

So I presume you voted to extend the Pension age as there will be no State payments between 65 years of age and 66. Then you will get your pre-retirement year.

I just want to clarify that this Bill is being brought forward by TDs who are entitled to full pension after 2 years service!! Ehh….am I missing something??

I’ll be about 85, as long as I’m breathing

@Richard can you see yourself dragging barrels of the “Black stuff”when your 80 or will the customers help you?

As I said above, retiring older people do not create work for young people. If someone stops working, the individual and the economy is the poorer.

That’s if they don’t move the goal posts in the meantime. Realistically it’ll prob be 70 for those of us in our 30′s

If Fianna Fail get re-elected (god forbid), they will raise it to 70. This is wrong. This does not have the shape or character of the kind of policy needed to improve the Irish workforce. Fianna Fail previously tried another controversial tactic: cut the minimum wage for the most vulnerable.

Why should someone earning €20 EUR per hour tell someone earning €8.65 EUR per hour and say ‘you’re earning too much’?

GOOD RIDDANCE TO FIANNA FAIL.

That’s bullshit. Statistics show that countries with better employment practices for the over-60s also have higher rates of employment for the under 25s. Think about it. A 60 year old has a wealth of experience that a 20 year old just couldn’t have. It’s never a straight swap.

We need to look at alternatives, like time-banking and job sharing, to enable a phased retirement while increasing young peoples’ participation in the labour market.

That’s a ridiculous idea it would create a completely unsustainable pensions bill if you were to have everybody in their mid-50s or early 60s claiming an old age pension until they are close to 80 or over?

Personally i think they should scrap the retirement age… thats not saying they should force everyone to work until an older age but they should give people the choice if they are fit and able to continue to work and want to do so …

The retirement was formulated when general life expectancy was in the 70s and now that it is pushed up and with better medical advancements people are well able to work longer….

I agree Peter and many people believe in this daft illogical notion. I remember an analogy, when it was claimed JCBs did men out of work with spades someone suggested that we would have full employment if they used spoons instead of spades.